Why Trellis?

Wine is a product of sunlight, and it follows then that to get the best wine each season the premiere grape-growers like Stryker Sonoma must make the best use of vital hours of sunlight. Trellising, a system of training the grape vine to grow on pre-strung wires or a central support posts to expose its shoots, leaves and fruit to the sun, is a key tool in achieving this goal. Premium, hand-crafted wine is essentially the product of photosynthesis, since great wines cannot be created from mediocre grapes. The vine’s leaves gather sunlight to fuel the process of converting carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to sugar and acid in the fruit. Once more, the ripeness, color, sugar and acid content, and flavor characteristics of the grape berry itself are influenced by how much direct sunlight it receives throughout the season. In order to achieve the best possible fruit, we must manage the way in which our grape vine’s leaves and fruit are exposed to sunlight. This is the job that trellising performs.

As with anywhere else in the world, there is no single “best” trellis system for a grape-growing region. Different climate factors such as warmer or cooler conditions, soil fertilities and drainage, vine characteristics, and varietals that may ripen earlier or later all require different approaches to trellising in order to achieve balanced canopy development. Apart from the Estate Old Vine Zinfandel acreage, most of the Stryker Sonoma vines are trellised with Vertical Shoot Positioning (VSP). Similar to the Guyot system, the Vertical Shoot Positioned trellis is designed to arrange shoots to grow upwards across guide wires, using them for structural support. Usually two to four fruiting canes are trained to grow in opposite directions along two levels of wire. This canopy system allows fruit to hang 3-4 ft. off the ground, and below the raft of vertically growing leaves. In this trellis system, the canopy is not divided like in the Scott Henry or Lyre systems. The VSP system is traditionally used where there is a higher risk of fungus amongst the vines, as the trellis keeps the foliage away from the ground and allows for good air circulation and light exposure throughout the canopy. 

VSP offers many advantages over other trellis systems, including its visual appeal when trimmed, allows for the use of machine harvesters, all the fruit is grown in one zone, and it suits the majority of wine grapes varietals. The VSP system allows Stryker to continue to create world-class wines from the best grapes possible. Achieving the proper acid and sugar content is vital to the successful creation of our small lot wines, and using the VSP trellis system continues to provide us with consistent quality fruit season after season. ~ Chris